evade timeline/history

September 2003
Bought Micra SuperS with 140101km

October 2003
Got autotechnica boss kit
Momo Race steering wheel
Stainless muffler

March 2004
Bought 2nd hand T25G turbo
Bought 2nd hand turbo manifold

May 2004
Bought T25G turbo, freshly rebuilt, with bov, some piping, etc. Sold original one I bought
Bought stainless pipes and mandrel bends to make up exhaust
Bought xede shift light
Got exhaust TIG'd up
Bought/installed greddy full auto turbo timer
bought/installed greddy e-manage

June 2004
Bought all whileline gear
14/6 - Car dropped off with turbo bits to mates place
25/6 - Car picked up finished.

July 2004
4/7 - Car tuned to 74kw @ XTC

November 2004
157000km
New tyres

March 2005
Wakefield raceway with Bosito - Micra meet with 2, life_coach

May 2005
EMS stinger ecu ordered/installed

June 2005
Car being tuned, hit 94kw. On road tuning and headgasket blew.

July 2005
166931km
6/7 - Japspec motor purchased from Deluxe auto in NSW
22/7 - Engine in

August 2005
167730km
13/8 - Car tuned to 8psi
14/8 - Car taken to heathcote, run PB of 14.85

September 2005
171230km
Car dyno'd at 92.4fwkw

October 2005
12/10 Gearbox sounds funny.
13/10 Bought 2nd hand gearbox
ordered JUN flywheel

November 2005
flywheel + gearbox installed

December 2005
Cooler was rubbing on radiator and sprung a leak.
Bought/installed 2nd hand radiator

Februray 2006
Dyno at 83kw
Fine tuned idle and squashed rich bits. Much better fuel eco now

March 2006
Front mount intercooler installed

April 2006
Bought/installed another gearbox again. The previous one died from input shaft bearing leaking and no lubrication.
Bought/installed non-cracked engine mounts
Datrats 190mm clutch installed

September 2006
Micra dyno'd with 10PSI - 110kw
Bought 200SX. Micra as a daily.

January 2007
All suspension stripped off. Sold to dens

February 2007
200000KM

April 2007
Decide to sell up.
Stock clutch installed.
190mm Clutch removed. Sold to Yom
JUN Flywheel. Sold to gtrholic I think..or turbo..
Depo headlights removed. Sold to Dens
HKB Bosskit removed. Sold to jay
Dashmat removed. Sold to Dens

September 2007
Bought Nissan S15 200SX.

October 2007
Ecu, Turbo, exhaust stripped off. Sold to Tony

February 2008
Car sold.

END of an era.

Some interesting facts:
Car owed me about $25,000 ALL in including labour/parts/car/everything.

I sold everything for just under $9,000

Thats why cars are a hobby...you will NEVER get back what you put into it...and people who think they can (i.e if I tried to sell the micra for $25k, are kidding themselves :D)

Anyway hope you enjoyed this little read!

Wow ... at least you kept a very detailed history ... but I know how you feel as I spent $25k too on my AE86 and only got back $10k for it when I eventually sold it.

Good read ...

flywheel got sold to me! no offence but for 25k i would have expected some of the turbo parts to be a little bit better made/quality, never the less, it worked and made great power.. where'd the manifold come from? it certainly all adds up in the end.. all the buyers for the parts certainly got a bargain

Get another one man ;) Grab a clean LX and keep it N/A and have some fun again!

---dens

hay, I have the clutch... I feel that a little legend lives in my car (when I finally install it)!

hey turbo, well the first manifold i got i ended up selling off to life_coach.

the manifold i ended up using was made up by a mate..who also made the fuelrail, dump pipe, cooler piping, water/oil lines and put it all together for me. it was done in under 10 days..hey it worked didnt it..it didnt cost me much either..i think all of that inc sr20 injectors, toyota ic, lines, whatever else cost me a little over 2k..which I thought wasn't bad. this was a while ago and i was on a tight budget! so thats why some things up to scratch..


I like the manifold. I agree the dump was a bit shitty but as you said, worked and made good power. I didn't realise how the wastegate exit hit the main exhaust..when I took it off and saw it it was pretty shocking...your SS one is going to absolutely kick arse.

25K is the EVERYTHING in total. the car, replacement motors, gearboxes, labour to change that crap out, tuning, etc, all the servicing, little mods here and there, absolutely everything related to the micra and its maintenance. i did a lot of it myself, but some things i cbf'd and just paid for...no offence taken!

lol.. i'd hate to add up what my red shit box is gonna owe me when i'm finally done.. that's why i'm not keeping tabs..:) .. would have been interesting to see what power your car would have made with decent dump pipe and intercooler piping.. i think a few little tweaks here and there would have gone a long way.. manifold is probably the best part of the kit! the wastegate pipe in the old dump didn't really hit anything, it was welded on top of the main exhaust and given about a 3mm hole for gas to pass through.. when i seen it i was like wtf.. if you ground that out to the 1.5' it was suppose to be, you would have gained a decent amount of hp i reckon. gotta stop somewhere though...you can get your money back on cars if you play your cards right.. fuck that but, buy a house, sit back and relax

I bought a new WRX a few years ago - around 46k on the road. 1k per month for payments, kept car for just over 2 years and sold it for 32k. Took the missus to the movies with the change after I payed out the loan. Thats a loss of 24k in 2 years!

A nett loss of 14k over 4 years on a Aaron's 'Journey' is great value. - And much more fun and rewarding along the way than a car like a Rex in my opinion. That's why I'm into Micra's :)

Yeah its interesting when you take it into that perspective..i learnt a lot as well.

turbo - thats what I was talking about..the way the wastegate went to that 3mm gap...

and seriously even if you play your cards right you wont get your all money back..although sometimes people get lucky..typically as soon as you start modifying it though you start loosing money.

but yes..buy a house sit back and relax is a good idea.

(after I do more travelling)

I must say if I were to do it all again...I would do it properly the first time around. We always start on some sort of budget and want to get things done cheaper..but in the end you spend more anyway..sometimes better to just have some patience and get it all sorted correctly...you will definately save money at the end of it all. (i.e my ecu choice then changing it)

i see your point, but i don't take any pleasure in taking a relatively cheap crappy car to a performance workshop and saying 'make it go as hard as a car i could have bought for $10k more'

the enjoyment comes from the trial and error and getting things done yourself and learning

you learn nothing from giving it to someone else apart from patience waiting for them to finish it

i think your car turned out great! its a pity you ended up parting it out and selling up

thanks, but i don't mean it like that..i mean just with little things.

ie. i thought i'd get away with a piggyback but that was just a HUGE pain in the arse and wouldve been easier to just go full ECU in the first place..

i bought a manifold which I thought didnt look right but got it anyway..and when the guy that made my current one saw it he thought it was crap...

i guess i did want to know what I could get out of a stock engine..since they are fairly cheap to replace..

it was lots of trial and error but also there was hardly any micra turbo information on the site when it was getting done..over the last 3-4 years the info has exploded haha..hopefully thanks to some of the early turbo micras you guys can save some cash and not make some of the same mistakes we did!

Yeah... Its so easy now, if I went to do it again I could literally do it for half price and get exactly the same stuff done in less than half the time...

You guys have it good..

Sean

if this site had better search facilities then we'd have it even easier again (ie. search by title)

but yeah we got it good, and appreciate all the info you've posted up! even if we are 2-3 years behind...

got any pics along the way???? or just any pics at all?? im keen to see everyones turbo setups!! maybe one day make up my own!!